Image: No. 3749 22 Bushnell Street, Ashmont Hall, photograph circa 1890. Photograph given to the Dorchester Historical Society in 1923 by architect Edwin J. Lewis Jr. Photpgraph taken by Wm F. Clark, 338 Washington St., Boston. “Building used as a private school.”
Date of construction: betweeen 1887 and 1889
Charles Kittredge, J. Frank Howland and Edwin R. DeLong formed a trust in 1887 for the purpose of purchasing land and erecting and furnishing a Private School building. After the building was constructed, they sold it to the Ashmont Universalist Parish in 1892. Due to the note on the photograph, we believe that the building was used for a private school before being sold the Church.
The following is from Ashmont by Douglass Shand-Tucci
p. 26 ff
The first house beyond All Saints’, on the far corner of Bushnell and Lombard, is not quite what it seems and relates chiefly to the square, for it was built as Ashmont Hall. Just as the Ashmont Block next to the Argyle provided a much-needed public hall for the village’s burgeoning social life in the 1890s, so also was there a need for a somewhat smaller and more intimate kind of clubhouse, and this very low, one-story, bungalow-type building (originally with a half-timbered gable, and a rooftop cupola) was built in 1888, probably from the designs of Edwin J. Lewis, for that purpose. Here were held elegant social evenings …
p. 70
Ashmont Private Day School … before it became the Ashmont Universalist Church, Ashmont Hall was built in 1887…. It is not surprising that the names of Herbert Carruth and Charles Kittredge headed the list of thirty-two subscribers for the Ashmont Day School, which like the Fairfax Club Stables documents so eloquently the kind of institutions Ashmont was creating for itself.
The following is from the inventory form for Carruth Street – Peabody Square, Boston Landmarks Commission
At the corner of Lombard and Bushnell, is the former Ashmont Nursery School , designed by Edmund J. Lewis, Jr. in 1888 and later adapted for use as a church in 1892 by Harrison Atwood; still later it was transformed into a private residence. Extremely rustic in appearance, this low, one story wood shingle covered structure is essentially L-shaped in form and rises from a rubble stone basement.
Source: atlases
1884 no house on lot
1889 E. R. DeLong et al trustees
1894 Ashmont Universalist Church.
1898 Ashmont Universalist Church
1904 Ashmont Universalist Church
1910 Ashmont Universalist Church
1918 Mass. Universal Convention
1933 Mary A. Sullivan
Boston Directory
1889 Edwin R. Delong (DeLong & Seaman), 5 Central wharf, h. Welles av. cor. Harley (39 Welles Ave)
Deed
May 21, 1887 from Loring W. Barnes of Attleboro to Charles Kittredge, J. Frank Howland and Edwin R. DeLong et al Trs. 1773.107 Lot 8 and pt lot 7 plan 1132.30 plan dated August 21, 1872
parcel of land
Declaration of Trust is at 1173.109
instrument April 1887 for the purpose of purchasing land and erecting and furnishing a Private School building and for other purposes
deed
August 6, 1892 from Charles F. Kittredge et als Trs to Ashmont Universalist Parish 2077.103
consideration $6227
parcel of land with the buildings thereon